


A Darker Shade of Twilight

by justholdstill



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-17 02:02:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11841657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justholdstill/pseuds/justholdstill
Summary: If they were older they would know to think of themselves as lovers, how to steal their pleasure from every moment, but they aren't and they don't;thisis what they have,thisthat is one boy clothed and not the other, a shuddering house around which winter howls but which is warm just the same,thisthat is a hand sliding under Remus' robes and an answering, half-broken sigh.





	A Darker Shade of Twilight

**A Darker Shade of Twilight**

It's not his fault when the first snow comes, not his fault that he doesn't want to look at Remus even when Remus is on his knees in the dust before him, because in the first days after his transformation he looks different - wan, like a plaster saint, looks so innocent that he makes Sirius think _Toujours Pur, Toujours Pur_ , which he isn't and never was, and then it's all over.

Remus wipes his mouth on his sleeve, and his hands on Sirius' knees are unbearably gentle, fluttering like pale moths. There's a rustle of fabric as Sirius fumbles in his discarded trousers for a cigarette, then the silver click and flash of a lighter, and in one soft, smoky exhalation Remus is pulled up along Sirius' naked body so that he's lying flush against him with his head on his shoulder.

Sirius looks past Remus' disheveled brown head to the window, and he can see that it's a darker shade of twilight than it was when they came here, huge white flakes cloaking everything, the woods, the world, in a heavy, unnerving stillness.

If they were older they would know to think of themselves as lovers, how to steal their pleasure from every moment, but they aren't and they don't; _this_ is what they have, _this_ that is one boy clothed and not the other, a shuddering house around which winter howls but which is warm just the same, _this_ that is a hand sliding under Remus' robes and an answering, half-broken sigh.

For another long heartbeat when Remus kisses him he fancies he can still taste blood in his mouth, wonders at the hunt that tears through Remus three days a month, commanded by the moon. Remus is not a boy built for the occasional violences his nature affords - his fingers are more suited to turning the yellowing pages of books, to doing that delicious teasing thing he's doing to Sirius, his legs more suited to pensive walk than frenzied chase, and yet, all the same...

all the same, fingernails raking down Sirius' back,

all the same a low growl that's almost not heard

and eyes, endlessly soft blue like the stone seas of that selfsame moon. " _Moony_ ," Sirius says when Remus has shut his eyes and turned his flushed face aside, and even he can hear how raw and tense his own voice is.

Sirius lights another cigarette and takes troubled drags on it between finding his clothes and pulling them on. Remus puts out the fire while Sirius smokes and ties his boots, and when they've put their cloaks on Remus kisses him one more time, his woolly mittened hands on either side of Sirius' face. He's not rough, but neither is he gentle, and that, Sirius thinks, is the way it ought to be. Remus tips his head to the side a bit and smiles, and Sirius is just about to say something, anything to stay for another minute when Remus says " _Lumos_ " and walks out into the swirling white world. Sirius keeps his head down and puts his feet in Remus' footsteps, 

 

*

 

The way Sirius sees it, books are Remus' addiction, the way he's always in them and near them and thinking about them, the way Remus is almost a book himself, needing to be thumbed open and devoured and loved down to every last line. There are jumbly stacks of them on the coffee table and lining the walls, teetering precariously on narrow shelves in the cozy kitchen, sometimes even books in the bedsheets, which leave odd bruises when rolled on accidentally. 

Sirius uses a battered paperback that says _A Farewell to Arms_ down the side in ugly yellow lettering as a coaster for his coffee - too strong, Remus always makes it too strong - and does his best to make conversation that avoids topics like who's dead and who's next. There's coffee these days, in mismatched mugs in a kitchen with brown cupboards; Sirius supposes they feel obligated to behave like grownups and enact some sort of preamble to sex, which they do half-heartedly until they are too impatient to wait anymore. Then he mashes his mouth - not very gracefully, he admits - over Remus', who has cafe-au-lait breath and chocolate breath, and, after a moment, Sirius-breath. 

Without any sort of finesse (which he more than makes up for in familiarity) he manages to grapple Remus backward onto the bed (no books this time) and licks his ear, eliciting a mutated snort that is really half groan, half snicker. Then, somehow, Remus has wriggled out of his clothes (long scars running the length of his torso), is naked and a little bony and suddenly Lord and Master of All That is Obscene.

"I always want you," Sirius says hoarsely as they fuck slowly, almost diffidently, the bedsprings creaking.

"I know," Remus replies, his hands full of blanket, his breath coming in measured gasps. When he bottoms he shivers at every touch, and Sirius buries his face in the back of Remus' neck, smelling soap and paper and the faintest musk of fur.

If they were wiser, they would know to think of themselves as lost, how to ease their hunger with the silences between the other things, but they aren't and they don't. What they have now is just this, intimacy like an island in desperation, a short time to sleep before another uncertain morning comes calling, just _this_ that is the best way of saying _I Love You_ and _Goodbye_ without actually speaking. 

In the morning, when it's drizzling and the city is ashy-pink and whispering, Remus' bed is warm. It's so quiet that Remus murmers he worries about dying, about Sirius dying, and Sirius has to kiss him a little violently to make him shut up.

"Next Friday, then?" he asks while he's tying his bootlaces.

 

*

In six months Lily and James are dead, and there's a little black-haired Potter boy who has neither mother nor father. Suddenly there's a Remus that doesn't have a Sirius, and he feels curiously adrift. He drinks his tea by himself in the evenings, the cup making its porcelain noises against the saucer, the world darkening and darkening outside in more ways than one. The sheets are still dark green, still soft and smelling of Sirius when they tangle about him, but Remus cries out in his sleep and dreams of green eyes and gray eyes and redemption and wonders, while he still has time to wonder, whether he ever had a Sirius at all.

 

*

 

Yes, this is how it goes.

They've been at it long enough that there's a pattern now, a script and stage directions and even costumes, beginning with the look Remus gives Sirius when he comes to Grimmauld Place and leaves his shabby overcoat in the front hallway. It's a look about apologies, about exhaustion and servitude and something that vaguely, once upon a time, resembled love. They've seen it before; it's hard to decipher whether ritual means comfort or whether it means stagnation, but it hardly seems to be relevant when Remus puts out his hand to touch the stubbly, angular slope of Sirius' jaw. 

If they weren't themselves they would know how to marvel at all they've been through, with and without one another, to congratulate one another on having waited out chance and years and lies, but they are themselves, as always, and they can't and instead Sirius takes Remus by the hand and doesn't let go as he leads him up the stairs to his bedroom.


End file.
